Sans-culottes

The Sans-culottes were the radical and militant partisans of the French Revolution during the 1790s. Their name came from the fact that they did not wear the breeches worn by the upper classes, wearing trousers instead. They consisted mostly of ill-clad and ill-equipped urban laborers, and they were the driving popular force behind the revolution against Louis XVI of France, supporting social equality, economic equality, and popular democracy. During the time of the First French Republic, the Sans-culottes were opposed to the bourgeoisie and were led by men such as Jacques Hebert and Jacques Roux, who were radical revolutionaries. Under Maximilien Robespierre, the Sans-culottes were represed, as Hebert, Roux, and others were put to death for opposing the conservative bureaucratic government. The Sans-culottes lost power after a failed 1795 uprising, and they would not have political power until the 1830 July Revolution.